


The Limits of Love

by RedsRightHand



Category: The Favourite (2018)
Genre: Angst, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, F/F, Sarah’s POV
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-01-09
Updated: 2020-01-09
Packaged: 2021-02-27 14:54:49
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 458
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22178899
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/RedsRightHand/pseuds/RedsRightHand
Summary: Upon witnessing Sarah’s dance-off with Samuel Masham at the ball, the queen grows agitated and demands Sarah take her back to her rooms. This is my take on their following moment in the corridor.
Relationships: Sarah Churchill Duchess of Marlborough/Anne Stuart Queen of the United Kingdom
Kudos: 14





	The Limits of Love

The slap comes out of nowhere, eliciting from Sarah an involuntary whimper of shock and pain. Hot tears begin to gather unbidden in her eyes, an added insult to her injury. To think that she regularly goes head to head with some of the most powerful bullies in Parliament without so much as flinching a muscle, yet finds herself reduced to tears by this frail woman before her. If anyone else in the court had dared lay a hand on her, so help her, God—

But Anne is not anyone else. She is not even the queen to Sarah in this moment. She is simply Mrs. Freeman, the Achilles’ heel Sarah has long tried so desperately to conceal with her barbs and dismissive airs—something she seems to have thus far managed to a moderately successful degree. All in all, her forceful insistence on remaining close to Anne has been widely interpreted (and summarily dismissed) as nothing more than sheer naked ambition by the rest of the court. Even Anne herself does not seem to realize the full extent of the hold she has on Sarah, who thinks it wiser to keep the true depth of her feelings to herself. It would not do to leave her heart unguarded, for she knows that Anne would take from her unrestrainedly if she allowed it, and that is a craving she simply cannot afford to give in to. No, the stakes are too high; she has too much to lose and too far to fall. 

A muffled sob snaps Sarah out of her daze. She looks up to see Anne blinking back tears of her own as the battle between rage, jealousy, and remorse plays out across her face. Sarah feels Anne’s unspoken agonies as keenly as she feels her own, but she would quite truthfully rather suck Harley off in open court than cry in front of Anne. Struggling to maintain her self control, it’s all she can do to manage a faint whisper of “It’s okay”. The words sit thickly on her tongue; nothing is in fact okay, but there are some hurts she will not stand to suffer, some concessions she simply cannot make, some parts of herself she is not willing to reveal, not even to Anne. Love, after all, has its limits.

Hoping that the quivering of her lip has not given her away, she swallows hard and decides to sue for peace: “Do you want to go fast?” Anne smiles and nods at the prospect of finding distraction in one of her favourite past times. Their wounds closed for now—however superficially—Sarah wheels her around, and they zoom, zoom! down the corridor to Sarah’s chamber, where the further distraction of her bed awaits.

**Author's Note:**

> I absolutely love Rachel Weisz and Olivia Coleman’s dynamic in this scene. Their expressions hint at a much more emotional depth than I thought the film generally gave their pairing credit for. And so this fic was born, to fill in those angsty gaps!


End file.
